The present invention relates in general to vibration isolation and more particularly concerns novel apparatus and techniques for providing omnidirectional vibration isolaton with reliable apparatus that is relatively easy and inexpensive to manufacture while providing nearly complete isolation from vibration in all directons, thereby helping to solve a serious problem in connection with making low-level measurements.
A typical prior-art air or gas spring for vibration isolation comprises a metal cylinder with a rigid gas-tight closure at one end and a flexible convoluted diaphragm seal and piston at the other end. The spring action provided by the enclosed gas offers very low stiffness when the piston is displaced axially. Although the lateral (usually horizontal) stiffness afforded to the piston by the convolution of the diaphragm is lower than a typical solid elastomer seal, such as an O-ring, the convolution stiffness is sufficiently high relative to the low axial stiffness afforded by the enclosed gas that significant vibration may be transmitted through the prior-art support. Although many of these vibrations in the lateral direction may be so small that they cannot be felt, they are significant in certain applications where exceptionally lowlevel signals of interest are detected by transducers, such as in certain medical experiments. The transmitted lateral vibrations may produce a signal that seriously interferes with the signal sought to be measured.
Accordingly, it is an important object of this invention to provide improved apparatus and techniques for isolating vibration.
It is another object of the invention to achieve the preceding object while significantly reducing the transmission of lateral vibration.
It is still another object of the invention to achieve one or more of the preceding objects by modifying a conventional air or gas spring in a manner that is relatively free from complexity, relatively inexpensive, relatively easy to manufacture and highly effective in significantly reducing vibration too small to feel.